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Nature: a Recurrent Theme in Wordsworth's Poetry

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Nature: a Recurrent Theme in Wordsworth's Poetry Scholars International Journal of Linguistics and Literature Abbreviated Key Title: Sch Int J Linguist Lit ISSN 2616-8677 (Print) |ISSN 2617-3468 (Online) Scholars Middle East Publishers, Dubai, United Arab Emirates Journal homepage: https://saudijournals.com Review Article Nature: A Recurrent Theme in Wordsworth’s Poetry Lok Raj Sharma* Associate Professor of English, Makawanpur Multiple Campus, Hetauda, Nepal DOI: 10.36348/sijll.2021.v04i01.003 | Received: 13.12.2020 | Accepted: 29.12.2020 | Published: 13.01.2021 *Corresponding author: Lok Raj Sharma Abstract This article attempts to deal with nature as a recurrent theme in William Wordsworth‟s poetry. He is one of the greatest romantic English poets. He views nature as a living entity that is a source of pleasure and education for him. He has given us sufficient heart-touching and beautiful poems that are the enduring treasures of romanticism, but only a few popular poems that reveal the growth and development of his love for nature, his concept of nature mysticism, joy in nature, universal love in nature, spiritual unity of nature, bond between nature and man, soothing influence and healing power of nature and nature‟s teaching potentiality have been taken from the corpus of his vast works under consideration for the study. Most of his poems can be well understood and analyzed through a vigilant consideration regarding his treatment of nature. Keywords: Nature, Poetry, Theme, William Wordsworth. Copyright © 2021 The Author(s): This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0) which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium for non-commercial use provided the original author and source are credited. NTRODUCTION Romantic poetry is a type of poetry that is I marked with the characteristics of subjectivity, William Wordsworth (7 April 1770 – 23 April spontaneity, depiction of nature, supernaturalism, 1850) was a great Romantic English poet. He was born simple poetic diction, revolt, melancholy and in Cockermouth, Cumberland, located in the Lake veneration of rustic life. The prime objective of this District of England. He was the second child of his article is to deal with the divergent dominant roles of father John Wordsworth, who was a legal representative nature depicted in Wordsworth‟s poetry. of James Lowther, 1st Earl of Lonsdale, and his mother Anne, who was the only daughter of William Cookson, mercer of Penrith. Wordsworth was Britain's poet LITERATURE REVIEW laureate from 1843 to 1850. Wordsworth is best known Nature is a broad term. It refers to the physical for “Lyrical Ballads” (1798) that was written in or material world along with its phenomena such as collaboration with Samuel Taylor Coleridge. “The snowing, raining, winding, clouding, fogging, blowing, Prelude” (1799) that is a Romantic epic and semi- flowing, thundering, lightening etc. It refers to all the autographical poem is considered his magnum opus. living and non-living beings such as animals, birds, Besides these, he has enriched English literature with plants, flowers, fish, insects, rocks, rivers, mountains, his large number of poems like “Ode on Intimations of clouds, snow, soil, ponds, hills etc. The occurrence of Immortality” (1807), “The Solitary Reaper” (1807), such natural things and natural phenomena influences “Composed upon Westminster Bridge” (1807), “The not only the poets, but also influences ordinary people World is Too Much with Us” (1807), “French in shaping their ideologies and life styles. Poets are Revolution” (1807), “Nuns Fret Not” (1807), “The specially influenced by nature. Oxford Dictionary of Daffodils” (1807), “To the Cuckoo” (1802), “Lucy English (2003) describes nature as “the phenomena of Gray‟ (1800), “Revolution and Independence‟ (1807), the physical world collectively, including plants, „To Milton” (1802) and so on. animals, the landscape, and other features and products of the earth as opposed to humans or human creations” “Lyrical Ballads” is regarded the Manifesto of (p.1172) [1]. This definition indicates that all the things the Romantic Movement in poetry. William and events that are not created by humans belong to Wordsworth, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Samuel Taylor nature. Coleridge, Lord Byron John Keats, Walt Scott, William Blake etc. are popular romantic poets of English Poetry is flexible because of its open literature. endedness. It can be interpreted and analyzed from Citation: Lok Raj Sharma (2021). Nature: A Recurrent Theme in Wordsworth‟s Poetry. Sch Int J Linguist Lit, 4(1), 14-20. 14 Lok Raj Sharma., Sch Int J Linguist Lit, Jan, 2020; 4(1): 14-20 diverse perspectives. Similarly, readers can perceive the world” (p.32). Yang and Zeng [15] think that “he different themes in a single poem. A theme is a crux of regarded nature as his spiritual home” (p.338). Neha an expression in writing or speech. Cuddon [2] asserts [16] maintains that “Wordsworth emphasized the moral that “the theme of a work is not its subject, but rather its influence of Nature. He spiritualized nature and central idea, which may be stated directly or indirectly” regarded her as a great moral teacher, as the best (p.913). Harmon [3] views the theme as “the abstract mother, guardian and nurse of man, and as an elevating concept that is made concrete through representation in influence” (p.1). Huang, Pei and Fu [17] assert that person, action, and image” (p.521). Kirszner and living in the crowded and noisy society, Wordsworth Mandell [4] give a descriptive definition of the theme felt greatly miserable. Only in nature, “he can find and maintain that the theme of a work of literature is its beauty and purity going into his own thinking; natural central or dominant idea. It is “conveyed through the world is his ideal word” (p.114). Almiqdady, Abu- selection and arrangement of details; through the Melhim and Al-Sobh [18] consider William emphasis of certain words, events, or images; and Wordsworth as “a worshipper of nature, nature‟s through the actions and reactions of characters” (p.3). devotee or high-priest, and his love of nature was Nature is one of the vital characters and themes in probably truer and tenderer than that of any other Wordsworth‟s poetry. English poet” (p.156). Poetry is a popular form of literature. It is Compton-Rickett [19] mentions that it was more musical, more emotional, more obscure, more Wordsworth‟s aim as a poet to “seek for beauty in implied and more figurative than other genres of meadow, woodland, and the mountain top, and to literature. Wordsworth [5] defines poetry as “the interpret this beauty in spiritual terms” (p.308). Rader spontaneous overflow of powerful feeling; it takes its [20] believes that “the poet recognizes a sense of joy in origin from emotion recollected in tranquility” (p.213). nature and a blessed power that rolls through all things His definition emphasizes the spontaneity of feelings, about us” (p.188). Willy [21] talking about Wordsworth and recollection of events in peaceful mood for poetic points out that “nature‟s healing power , which for creation. Johnson [6] views poetry as “the art of uniting some may be merely an outworn doctrine, was for him pleasure with truth by recalling imagination to the help a fact of experience, and the rapture of that experience” of reason” (p.57). He evaluates poetry as an art that (p.283). Read [22] concerning the theme of unites pleasure and truth. Smith (1968) asserts that Wordsworth‟s poetry maintains that nature as “the imagination is “the power that leads us to truth; it is at highest theme of poetry” (p.127). Symons [23] informs once vision and reconstruction” (p.16). For Hudson [7], that Wordsworth conveys the live part of natural truth poetry is “an interpretation of life through imagination to us as “no other poets have ever done, no other poets and feelings” (p.80). He associates poetry with having had in him so much of the reflective peasant” description of life. The description is intensified (p.92). Wordsworth is close to the common places of through imagination and feelings that are the backbone life. Smith [24] contends that “Wordsworth had never of poetry. Malik [8] maintains that “the human heart, any wish to escape from the common places of life; he feelings and emotions constitutes the essence of poetry” accepted them all, and viewed them with a calmness (p.87). and a courage that could never been shaken” (p.13). Nature is superior to humans. Compton-Rickett [19] Views on Wordsworth and his treatment of Nature asserts that “apart from the sanctifying touch of nature, Several critics and writers have expressed their men and women are poor creatures to Wordsworth; the views about Wordsworth and treatment of nature in his farther we travel from Nature, the more paltry we poetry. Parab [9] remarks that “Wordsworth as become” (p.311). romantics urges that a union with nature is what frees the mind from the stir and thrust of its own dark Grierson and Smith [25] consider that “ emotions” (p.1589). Mir [10] asserts that “his heart is Wordsworth had keen ear too for all natural sounds, the enriched in the company of nature and he does not want calls of beasts and birds, and the sounds of winds and to leave its company” (p. 723). Zeng [11] affirms that waters; the soughing of boughs in a high wind set his “he eulogizes nature‟s landscape---pastoral countryside mind working, and he composed thousands of lines full of flowers, trees, birds, sky and streams, he pays wandering by the side of a stream” (p.307). attention to the influence of nature on human‟s hearts” Wordsworth takes nature as a teacher.
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